Women’s Pro Baseball Returns With Great Fanfare
Women’s professional baseball is back! Seventy years after the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League ended, the opening day of the Women’s Pro Baseball League brought back more than just bittersweet memories for the former players. Opening day for the new women’s league was August 1, 2026, and the game was played at Robin Roberts Stadium in Springfield, Illinois.
Maybelle Blair, 99, a former AAGPBL player addressed the players and audience and then threw out the first pitch, reported News Channel 20. Although injured, she said she would not have missed the opening. “This is the happiest day of my life,” Blair said.
Blair serves as an honoree chair of the new league, and the official mascot is named Maybelle after her and features Blair’s white hair and sunglasses.
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A League for Women
Women’s baseball was celebrated in the 1992 movie A League of Their Own according to the Baseball Hall of Fame. The league ran from 1943 to 1954 with 280 players and four teams: the Racine Belles, South Bend Blue Sox, Kenosha Comets and Rockford Peaches.
The league was very successful during the war years but closed a few years later as interest and revenues waned.
Fast forward to today and the Women’s Pro Baseball League also consists of four teams: the Boston Hunters, Los Angeles Queens, San Francisco Firebells and New York Heights, reported NPR. The cities were chosen because of their history of sports loyalty and market share. But the entire six-week season will be played in Springfield.
Opening Day
Hundreds of fans waited outside in the rain for hours before the game began. When the gates opened, fans rushed to the merchandise booth and sales were capped at two per person because of the demand. While many of the fans lived locally, some came from as far away as Australia. When the rain subsided, the game between the LA Queens who defeated the NY Heights began in front of a sold-out crowd.
Many of the players began playing young but their baseball journeys stalled when they grew older and were not allowed to play with boys. This only fueled their desire to keep playing in other venues, like universities, the Women’s Baseball World Cup and some have played in regional men’s leagues.
“I’ve been practicing so long on my own,” Boston’s first baseman, Sabrina Robinson told NPR during preseason training. “It’s so different finally playing with other [professionals] in the same place now.”
With the popularity of women’s sports growing, it was only a matter of time for the idea of a professional women’s league to take root and grow..
For young fans, they may never know that women’s professional baseball wasn’t always a thing. Now little girls can go to sleep and dream about becoming a baseball player. Baseball is not just for boys anymore.
